The giant groaned in self-abasement, and beat his chest with his great fists. But Grôm, who would allow no dissensions in his following, answered sternly:
“Be silent. You might have done no better yourself.”
Then for a time there was no more said, while 237 Grôm, sitting there in the dark with the girl’s face buried in his great shaggy chest, thought out his plans. It was plain to him, from what he had seen in that last instant of daylight, that the entrance was blocked impregnably. Moreover, he judged that any attempt to work an opening in that direction would be likely, for the present, to bring more rocks down upon them. It would be better, first, to feel their way on into the cave in the hope of finding another exit. He was not afraid of getting lost, no matter how absolute the dark, because he possessed that sixth sense, so long ago vanished from modern man’s equipment––the sense of direction. He knew that, as a matter of course, he could find his way back to this starting-point whenever he would.
“Come on!” he ordered at last, lifting A-ya and holding her hand in his grasp. Reaching out with his spear, he kept tapping the ground before him as he went, and occasionally the wall upon his left. Sometimes, too, he would reach upwards to assure himself that there was no lowering of the rocky ceiling. A spear’s length to the right, more or less, he got always a splash of water.
With their fine senses intensely alert, they were able to make fair progress, even though unaided by their eyes. But Grôm checked his advance abruptly. He had a perception of some obstacle before him. He reached out his spear as far as he could. It touched a soft object. The object, whatever it was, surged violently beneath the touch. His flesh crept, and the 238 shaggy hair uplifted on his neck. “Back!” he hissed, thrusting A-ya off to arm’s length and bracing his spear point before him to receive the expected attack. A pair of faintly phosphorescent eyes, small, but so wide apart as to show that their owner’s head must have been enormous, flashed round upon them. There was a hoarse squeal of alarm, and a heavy body went floundering off into the water. They could hear it swimming away in hot haste.
Every one drew a long breath. Then, after a few moments, A-ya laughed softly:
“It’s good to find something at last that runs away from us instead of after us!” said she.
A little further on the cave wall turned to the left. A few steps, and their path came to an end. There was water ahead of them, and on both sides. Grôm’s exploring spear assured them that it was deep water.
“We must swim,” said he. “Leave your clubs behind.” And leading the way down into the unknown tide, he struck out straight ahead.
It was nerve-testing work swimming thus through that unseen water to an unguessed goal; but Grôm was unhesitating, and his companions rested upon his steady will. The water was of a summer warmth, and slightly salt, which convinced him that it had free communication with the sunlit tides outside. Several times he came within touch of the rocky walls of the cavern, and found that they went straight down to a depth he could not guess. But he kept on with hope 239 and confidence at a leisurely pace, which, in that bland and windless flood, he knew that every member of his party could have maintained for half a day.